


Life Round Here

by riverlight



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-06 17:01:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1109324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riverlight/pseuds/riverlight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray laughs. “Hey, homes,” he says, like it’s been a week and not nearly two years since they’ve seen each other. </p><p>“Jesus motherfucking Christ,” Brad says, before he can help himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Life Round Here

**Author's Note:**

  * For [titaniumsporkery](https://archiveofourown.org/users/titaniumsporkery/gifts).



> For tonyespera on tumblr, who wanted Colbert/Person, with Ray being smart. Hope this works for you! This story is inspired by [this](http://girls-for-gays.tumblr.com/post/64431343859) (NSFW) gifset, oh, and [this](http://tonyespera.tumblr.com/tagged/I%27m-super-here-for-this-wow-yes-please), and I encourage you all to go look, because holy god, that shit is hot. 
> 
> Warnings for casual misogyny, fat-phobia, and profanity. I can’t imagine you’re reading a Generation Kill story without knowing this is a possibility, but still, should you need a warning, there it is. *g*

When Brad gets back from the john, Burke slides him a fresh pint across the table and says, “There’s a guy at the bar looking for you, Colbert.”

Marks snorts a laugh. “Looking for his monster dick, you mean,” he says, picking through the crumbs that are all that remain of their crisp packets. “Story’s out, Colbert. He must have heard about your bloody great willy and decided to come see if the rumours are true.” 

“He could just ask your girlfriend, Marks,” MacIain says. “Since you’re so small she’s been stepping out with everyone she can get to put up with her ugly face.”

“Gents,” Brad says, and takes a healthy swig of his beer. If there’s one thing he’ll miss when he’s back in the States, it’s the beer. “If you wanted to see my dick, all you had to do was ask.” He kicks his feet up on the bench opposite and tilts his chair back, letting his legs sprawl open. It’s Friday night, he’s just back from 24 hours in and out of a zodiac in the English Channel, and he’s well on his way to drunk and about to get drunker: life is good.

MacIain feigns shock. “I thought asking was against your regs. Or am I confusing you Yanks with some other backwards country that has yet to enter the twenty-first century?”

“Don’t hold the sins of my government against me, MacIain,” Brad says. “I’m from the communist republic of California. I just follow the rules, I don’t have to like them.”

“Good, then,” Burke says, cheerfully swigging the last of his pint and starting on his fresh one. “Go figure out what this guy wants, and if he wants to take you home, then for god’s sake, _go._ If he lets you get a leg over, we’ll all be fucking grateful, you uptight bastard.”

Brad rolls his eyes. “I know this may have escaped your notice,” he says, “but I’m from States; you sorry excuses for Marines are the only people I know in this godforsaken country.” 

“All the same,” Burke says, unperturbed. “He was asking John if he’d seen, and I quote, ‘a tall Viking bastard who looks like he shits icicles and eats puppies for breakfast,’ and if you tell me that isn’t you, I’ll say you’re a fucking great liar.”

“First you imply I’m a homosexual, now you call me a liar?” Brad says, shaking his head in mock dismay. “Kids these days. There’s no respect.” He drains his glass and lets the legs of his chair tilt back down to thud against the floor “Fine. I’ll go handle it.”

“Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” Marks calls, over the dull ‘thank god it’s the weekend’ roar of the pub. Brad flips him a two-fingered salute and keeps walking.

* * *

Two years he’s been in Devon and he isn’t used to it yet, the way everything’s familiar enough that he feels comfortable but just different enough to throw him off: institutional food in the canteen, the same as he’s eaten in mess halls in Oceanside and Bagram and Fallujah and Norfolk; dull featureless racks in the barracks, same olive-drab wool blankets as every military base he’s seen; but then he goes off base and is reminded he’s in England by the funny European cars, the odd foods in the supermarkets, the fucking miserable weather.

But all the same he’s used to it enough that he doesn’t pay particular attention to anything as he makes his way from the large front room and into the snug and towards the bar, lets the lilting West Country accents and the shouts of good-natured sports rivalries and the plummy tones of the BBC announcer on the TV set over the bar wash over him, a blur of background noise. And he’s not here every week, but it’s often enough that some of the regular faces are familiar, even if he doesn’t know the names: the sad-eyed woman who sits at the far end of the bar; the scruffy professor type who favors blazers with elbow patches; the red-headed man with the temper. 

And it’s a Royal Marine pub, too, which is maybe why it takes him a moment to spot the anomaly, Ray Person leaning up against the copper edge of the bar with a cocky tilt to his shoulders and an air of easy confidence like he fucking belongs here in a bar in Devon, a mocking quirk to his mouth and his eyes steady on Brad as he comes closer. 

“Jesus motherfucking Christ,” Brad says, before he can help himself. 

Ray laughs. “Hey, homes,” he says, like it’s been a week and not nearly two years since they’ve seen each other. “Long time no fucking see, you fucking giant. What did you do, grow another foot taller just to better intimidate the Brits?” 

“You’ve just been out of the Corps long enough that you’ve forgotten what real men look like,” Brad shoots back, automatically. “Spend enough time with pussy civilians and you begin to think it’s normal to be a fat bastard who drives his SUV everywhere because he’s too fucking fat to take the stairs.”

“Fuck yeah, homes,” Ray says in apparent agreement. “You’d never believe some of the fat fucks I see at the gym.” 

“Right,” Brad says, ignoring that in favor of the important details, namely: what the fuck Ray Person is doing in the Saddler’s Arms without any warning. “What the fuck, Person.” 

“I don’t mean _you,_ homes!” Ray says, wide-eyed and mocking. “Why you gotta assume I’d insult you like that?” He slaps one hand to his heart, faux-wounded. Brad rolls his eyes.

“No, Person, I mean, what the fuck are you doing here?” Brad says. They’re beginning to attract glances, now, the kind of rapid once-over that means the guy on the barstool next to them is trying to figure out if they’re going to be trouble, so Brad leans over Ray’s shoulder to catch the bartender’s attention, signals for two more pints: nothing to see here, gents, move it along. 

“Can’t a man pay a visit to his former CO?” Ray says, all innocence.

“No,” Brad says flatly. “At least not you.” 

“I’m wounded, Brad,” Ray says. “And after I ferried your ass around Iraq, too.” He gestures at the pub. “Maybe I just wanted a vacation.”

Brad snorts. “In England? Yeah, right.” John slides them their pints, and Brad stares at Ray, but Ray doesn’t cave. “Fine, then, don’t tell me,” Brad says. He’s feeling warm and mellow and good thanks to a hot shower and fried food and beer and the prospect of 72 hours leave; whatever the fuck Ray’s doing here, he’ll get it out of him eventually. “Pull up a stool, you fucking hick, and drink this beer I’ve so thoughtfully acquired for you,” he says. Brad laughs, he can’t help it. Ray motherfucking Person, live and in person and in a pub in Devon.

Ray stares at him suspiciously, but does, perching half-assed on the edge of the barstool he’s been leaning against. Brad himself leans one elbow against the bar and crosses his ankles; he’s been sitting all day, he can stand for a little while. He’s close enough to Ray that they keep brushing up against each other accidentally, knees and elbows and hands, but whatever, boundaries are for civilians; Brad’s spent weeks crammed with Ray into the seats of a Humvee, eating and sleeping and shitting and jacking off with less privacy than this. 

“So,” Brad says. “If you’re not going to tell me to what I owe the pleasure of your company, you should at least give me the benefit of your presence and tell me all the news.” He raises his eyebrows expectantly. 

Ray looks at him a moment, then grins, that sharp-edged grin of his. “Brad, Brad, Brad,” he says, shaking his head. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you missed us.” He sounds gleeful. “The Iceman, admitting to feelings? What _is_ the world coming to.”

Brad snorts. “Missed having a bunch of whiskey-tango fuck-ups around to laugh at, maybe,” he says.

Ray drains his pint in one long swallow, slams his glass down on the bar and shakes his head, dog-like. He’s got beer on his chin. “Don’t front, homes, you missed your Ray-Ray,” he says. His mouth curls up in a smile, dark eyes knowing. 

And yeah, okay, Brad kind of did.

* * *

It’s not that Brad doesn’t keep in touch; he gets emails from Nate, sometimes, quick dashed-off notes asking Brad’s opinion on something or sharing a story he thinks Brad would like, and they spend a few rounds of replies catching each other up until one of them gets too busy and the email thread drifts into silence for a few months. Poke sends him rants from work when he’s bored; he gets the occasional message from Kocher. He gets the obligatory round of engagement and wedding and baby announcements. Even Reporter occasionally writes.

But if Ray’s here for whatever mysterious reason that he’s not sharing with Brad, Brad’s not above pumping him for information, so he leans back against the bar and steadily drinks his beer and lets Ray give him the commentary: Hasser’s wedding, Trombley getting suspended from the LAPD, Rudy’s new reality TV show, Christeson fainting in the delivery room when his daughter was born. 

At some point, Burke wanders past on his way back from the bathroom and claps Brad on the shoulder, eyeing Ray with frank interest, but he doesn’t say anything beyond “We’ll see you on Tuesday, you tosser,” and he gives Brad an amused look but he doesn’t stop. 

That shifts them onto the topic of what Brad’s been doing, PRMC and the All Arms Commando Course, the swimmer and canoe operations with C squadron, the anti-terrorism training with M squadron. “God damn it, Brad,” Ray says, and whistles, low. “You’re a lucky fucking bastard, you know that? Half the guys would fucking teabag the President if it’d get them the chance to do this shit.” 

“Jesus Christ, Ray,” Brad says, shaking his head. The thing is, his term here’s almost up, and he doesn’t know what’s next: deployment, probably. He’s not scared of it—this is his fucking job—but it’s not like he just spent the better part of a day freezing his balls off in ice-cold water for the fun of it, either. What he’s learning here he’s going to use, in the service of his country and protecting the guys on his team. It’s not just some fucking grand adventure.

Ray’s watching him, eyes dark and steady. There’s a thoughtful purse to his mouth. “Right,” he says, like he knows what Brad’s thinking. He probably does; the thing about Ray that Brad always forgets is how fucking observant he is. “So, Brad,” he says, standing up and fishing his billfold out of his jeans pocket and slapping a crisp ten-pound note on the bar, “please tell me you have an apartment here, because I didn’t book a hotel room.”

Brad raises an eyebrow. “What kind of piss-poor planning is that, Ray?” he says. “First you refuse to tell me why you’re here, now you tell me you don’t have anywhere to stay? What kind of a Recon Marine are you?” 

Ray smirks. “A former one, homes, and you know it, so come on, do you have a place or am I going to be sleeping on the streets tonight?” 

“There are always the guest apartments on base,” Brad says, and Ray makes one of his weirdly exaggerated horrified faces, but he must take that as the idle threat it is, because he just lets Brad shove him out the door of the pub.

* * *

Brad’s had just enough to drink that he’s pleasantly warm and the lights of Lympstone slide past in a surrealistic blur, but not so drunk that he can’t walk. He does in fact have an apartment here, a tiny pre-furnished studio that he rented sight-unseen from an instructor in CTCRM, and they’re almost there when it occurs to him, the way things do when he’s drunk. “Person,” he says, “how the fuck did you find me?”

Ray grins, his teeth a flash of white in the light of the streetlight. “Called your mom, homes. She said to tell you you owe her like five phone calls and she’s thinking of disowning you if you don’t at least let her know you’re alive.” 

This sounds, he has to admit, exactly like his mother; even when he doesn’t call she has a way of keeping tabs on where he is and what he’s been up to. Brad’s pretty sure the idea of Ray talking to his mother will horrify him in the morning, but luckily he’s also drunk enough that that seems like a distant concern. Also it fucking sounds like Ray; Brad forgets how he got his mother’s number in the first place, but of course he’d use it.

“Fine, then,” he says. “Second question: how long are you staying?”

They’re at the corner of Brad’s street, now, a little narrow lane lined with small brick row houses. Ray pauses just on the edge of the circle of streetlight and tilts his head a little, eyes wide and steady in the dimness. “Depends,” he says. “Are you going to let me take you home and fuck you?”

Jesus. Brad’s reflexes are a little slow right now; he can’t help the shocked hitch in his breathing. He’s pretty sure Ray hears it, judging by the way one corner of his mouth curves up into a sly smile. “Ray,” Brad says, stalling. “Was this a transatlantic booty call?” 

Ray grins. “Does that sound like something I’d do, Brad?” he asks. His voice is light, but he’s got his hands shoved in his pockets, Brad notes, shoulders tense.

“Yeah,” Brad says, evenly. “It fucking does.” He starts walking again, lengthening his stride, and it takes Ray a second to catch on. Brad turns to look at him, walking backwards. “Well?” he says. “You coming?” 

Ray shakes himself out of his stillness and follows, not trying to catch up, just an ambling lope. “Not yet, homes,” he purrs. “But the night is young.”

“That a promise?” Brad says. 

Ray looks at him, eyes gleaming. “Fuck yeah, it is,” he says. 

“Good,” Brad says, and gestures Ray ahead of him up his front walk.

* * *

Ray steps in close as he’s opening his front door, and the heat of his body makes Brad shiver; Ray must feel it, because he hums approvingly. “You should tell me if there are things you don’t want, Brad,” Ray murmurs into his ear, and his voice is low and rough in a way that makes Brad’s whole body flush with heat.

“Thought you said you were going to fuck me,” Brad says. “I’m on board with that plan, or are you not gonna follow through?” He manages to get the door open, finally, and spins Ray around and shoves him up against it, boxing him in with his hands and flipping the lock at the same time. He’s not that much taller than Ray, but he’s been training hard for two years; he’s got the advantage in both height and weight, and he knows how to use it. 

Ray looks up at him, eyebrows raised, eyes gleaming. “Oh, I can back my shit up,” he says, voice amused, and swings his arms up suddenly to knock Brad’s hands away, sliding his hands down Brad’s arms to grab his wrists. “See?” he says, raising one eyebrow. “How could you doubt your Ray-Ray, homes?”

Ray’s hands are hot. He’s lean, but he’s strong; Brad would have to work to break his grip. “Fuck,” Brad says, because fuck, that makes him hard. 

“Yeah, that’s the idea,” Ray says, gaze knowing. “You like that, Brad?”

“I should have known you’d be fucking mouthy,” Brad says, rather than ‘yes.’ Ray smirks.

“You know it,” he says. “Now where’s your bedroom? I’m not blowing you in your front hallway, you fucking philistine.” 

Ray grins when Brad steps back, that sharp-edged, knowing grin, and Brad shivers again. Fuck.

* * *

Ray does blow him, just fucking shoves Brad onto his bed and slides to his knees, unzips Brad’s jeans and goes to town. Three hours ago he was drinking beer with his British squad-mates; now he’s got Ray Person on his knees in front of him, looking up at him, gaze hot and suggestive, lips stretched wide and obscene around Brad’s cock. Jesus fucking Christ.

The thing is, it’s easy to forget is how fucking smart Ray is. Oh, Brad knows it; he fucking chose him for his team in Iraq, for god’s sake. But even so it’s easy to get distracted by Ray’s inability to ever be serious and his habit of saying whatever fucking thing pops into his head at any given time. So Brad hadn’t anticipated this, that somewhere along the line, in between two tours of the Middle East and more than four years of improbable friendship, Ray’s been paying attention and has figured out what gets Brad off in bed. 

He blows Brad while jerking himself off; he flips Brad over effortlessly and smacks his ass while whispering dirty promises in his ear; he shoves Brad down on his face and keeps him there with one hand while he palms Brad’s cock with the other. The whole fucking time Brad feels off-balance, slightly shocked: it’s the booze, yeah, and the lurking exhaustion, but it’s mostly Ray, leaning his weight into Brad to hold him down: cocky and arrogant and entirely confident, like it doesn’t matter that Brad was once his CO or that Brad could flip him if he wanted because Ray’s got him figured out. 

And he fucking does. Under his eyes Brad feels taken apart, examined, _known;_ Ray’s hold on his wrists makes him want to struggle just so Ray will push back. By the time Ray opens him up with his fingers, Brad’s muscles feel liquid with pleasure and the sheets are wrinkled where he’s grabbed them. “Fuck yeah, fuck yeah, fuck yeah,” Ray’s muttering, and even that’s hot: Ray Person so turned on he forgets to be even his own weird brand of eloquent and is reduced to simple lust, a male animal, wanting to come. 

Brad groans so loud at the first slide of Ray’s cock that the neighbors probably hear, and then when Ray lowers his entire body to rest on Brad’s back, letting Brad carry his full weight so he can get one hand on Brad’s cock, Brad bites his lip so hard he tastes blood. “Fuck, _yes,”_ he manages, and then Ray uses the hand that’s not on Brad’s cock to grab his chin and pull him into an open-mouthed, panting kiss, and that’s it, that’s all she wrote. Brad comes so hard he can’t breathe.

“Fuck, Brad,” Ray says, some indeterminate time later during which he apparently got rid of the condom and got a washcloth while Brad was still coming down. “Did I fuck you into incoherence?” He sounds pleased. 

“Mmph,” Brad manages. “Gloat later.” He’s gonna be asleep in like five seconds; he can barely keep his eyes open. 

“Guess so, homes,” Ray says, sounding satisfied. Brad tugs up the sheet and then he’s out.

* * *

When he wakes up he’s in bed alone, and the clock on the dresser indicates he’s slept fourteen hours. Huh. Brad stretches, tosses on boxers and an old PT sweatshirt, and goes to find Ray.

Ray’s at the kitchen table, one of Brad’s landlord’s collection of paperback mystery novels folded open in front of him. “Morning, homes,” Ray says cheerfully. “Coffee’s on.” 

Ray gives him two minutes to down his first sips of coffee, and then he leans towards Brad across the table. “So, homes,” he says, eyes bright. “You going to introduce me to these tea-drinking, monarchy-loving socialists you’re working with, or am I gonna have to pine around your house all by my lonesome?” 

Brad thinks about it. It’d probably be pretty fucking funny, Ray and Burke and Marks and MacIain telling Recon tall tales over a couple of pints. “I don’t know, Ray,” Brad says. “You going to tell me why the fuck you’re in England when last I heard you were murdering pop songs with your band in Missouri?” 

“Nope,” Ray says, and smirks. “But if you play your cards right I’ll blow you later, so there’s that.” 

“Right,” Brad says. He can feel his lips turning up in an involuntary smile. “I’ll get it out of you by Tuesday, Person, don’t think I won’t,” Brad says, feeling compelled to warn him. 

Ray grins. “I’ll take that bet, homes.”

“You’re on,” Brad says, and grins back at him.

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea whether Brad would actually have an apartment off-base, but really, are you kidding me? This shit is made up, yo. If I’m making Brad get down with Ray-Ray, I think an apartment is the least of my worries. (And if there are actual Recon Marines reading this who can contradict my made-up details, well—oh god, I really don’t want to know. *g* Sorry, Recon Marines!)
> 
> Also, I have no idea why Ray’s in England. I could say “he’s on tour, doing solo shows as an opener for some band,” but really, that’d just be speculation: he didn’t want to tell Brad, and he didn’t want to tell me, either. Just roll with it.
> 
> Thanks to amoama for the read-through, and to nursedarry for the brit-pick. (I’m American, and it shows, apparently, so: thanks, lady!) Much appreciated, both of you. 
> 
> Title is from James Blake, “Life Round Here.”


End file.
